In The News

Salary hikes for government employees are possible–but only if the Aquino government, after it conducts a long-delayed review of the pay schedule for state workers, finds them “feasible.”

ACT Teachers Rep. Antonio L. Tinio slammed today the statement of the Aquino administration, aired by the Department of Budget and Management, which said that government needs to study first the compensation classification system (CCS) of government employees before it can propose pay increases. The DBM said it will probably have its findings ready by 2016.

The administration issued this statement as its response to 39 bills heard today by the House Committee on Appropriations calling for increases in the salaries and benefits of government employees, including Tinio’s House Bill 245 for teachers and non-teaching staff in basic education, HB 246 for instructors and professors in universities and colleges, and HB 250 for a P4,000 monthly Personnel Economic Relief Allowance. Also included is HB 3015 calling for an additional P6,000 in the minimum pay of all government employees.

Said Tinio, “This statement proves that this administration does not heed the loud clamor of state workers for immediate economic relief. It refuses to include provisions for salary increases in its proposed budgets, like the one its recently submitted to Congress for 2015.”

“Secondly, its belated review of the CCS shows that this administration violated another law–the Salary Standardization Law 3–and trampled the rights of government employees workers to adequate compensation in the process.”

Section 1(e) of Joint Resolution No. 4 or the SSL 3 mandates government to conduct a periodic review of the salary scale every three years upon effectivity of the law, taking into consideration “the possible erosion in the purchasing power due to inflation,” among other factors.

“The fact remains that workers in the government need salary increases because of the high costs of living, not because DBM or Aquino says so. They need pay hikes now, not in 2016,” Tinio added.

Tinio urged Congress to urgently act on the 39 proposed measures increasing the compensation for government employees in the face of Malacañang’s insensitivity to the plight of teachers and other government employees. ###

‘It seemed that in the DepEd’s view, taking to the streets to call for an increase in pay was tantamount to neglecting the millions of schoolchildren nationwide. “Let us draw the line at abandoning our children,” it intoned. “As educators and civil servants, let us always keep the interests of our learners in mind.”

‘That is an unfortunate, if not insulting, statement. Teachers, especially the public-school variety, are among the most patient, docile people around. They toil in the most parsimonious conditions, their classrooms, school supplies and general campus facilities the perennial poor relations of vastly better-funded private schools. They are obliged to manage classes whose volumes are beyond the viable norm, yet they soldier on. During elections they do double-duty as vote-counters—a perilous task that puts them in the crosshairs of violent competition among political factions—and even have to wait to be compensated for it.

‘And, since 2009, their entry-level pay has been pegged at P18,549—lower even than what fresh graduates initially get in the call-center industry. That last salary adjustment five years ago raised the teachers’ pay by P6,523, but here’s the cruel catch: It wasn’t given in one go, but in four tranches over four years, from 2009 to 2012. The adjustment mandated by law as due the public school teachers took years to implement, and the paltry sum still had to be broken down into nearly negligible installments.

‘Which other profession is subjected to indignities like this? Perhaps other government employees endure the same excruciatingly slow improvements in work benefits, but as opposed to, say, clerks in a mayor’s office, teachers surely deserve greater attention because of the unique work they do: Their wellbeing translates directly to the wellbeing of the children under their care. They can’t teach kids properly without proper training on their own, or adequate school facilities, or enough remuneration to sustain them in mind and body. Certainly they can’t be expected to be motivated to do their jobs well, never mind excel, if their pay remains shockingly low.

‘How much wage increase are the teachers seeking this time? From P18,549 to P25,000. Is that too high a figure for such a consequential job as teaching the hope of the motherland? The 1991 Congressional Commission on Education pegged the minimum monthly salary that teachers should be receiving at even a higher figure—P28,000.

‘Malacañang’s response to the teachers’ petition for a pay increase is quite hard to take. “There was no fund identified as source of the salary hike they are waiting for,” said Communications Secretary Herminio Coloma Jr. The same administration that coughed up billions of pesos under a curious mechanism called the Disbursement Acceleration Program now pleads penury when it comes to sparing a few million pesos for the welfare of some 550,000 hard-up public school teachers across the country.’

May pera sa pork at korupsyon, pero wala sa edukasyon!

Increase salaries of public school teachers and non-teaching personnel! P25,000 minimum monthly salary for teachers, P15,000 for non-teaching personnel!

ACT Teachers Party-List Rep. Antonio Tinio joined teachers and non-teaching personnel in basic and higher education in a march from Morayta to Mendiola to demand higher salaries for workers in the education sector. The protest action coincides with the budget preparation phase, during which DepEd and CHED along with the other agencies draft their proposed 2015 budgets.

The education workers demand for a minimum monthly salaries of P25,000 for teachers in basic education, P26,878 (Salary Grade 16) for faculty in SUCs, and an additional P6,000 in the base pay of non-teaching staff. They demand for increases in the bonuses and allowances including chalk allowance and PERA.

Lastly, they call for tax relief measures that will make their earnings catch up with the increase in the prices of basic commodities. These include an increase of basic personal and additional exemptions to P75,000 and P40,000 per dependent as well as the raising to P60,000 the ceiling for tax-exempt bonuses.

These demands, Tinio maintained, are more than covered by the P945 billion presidential and congressional pork barrel still in the 2014 budget, which funds are expected to be proposed again in the next year.

“We have said every year that the biggest savings of government is on teachers and other school staff, along with those in other sectors,” said Tinio. “This policy of tightening the belt of the education sector forces teaching and non-teaching personnel to live within starvation salaries and bonuses, and take on the workload of several persons due to lack of items.”

“As early as now, we are banging on the doors of DBM and Malacanang. We say to them–Let go of their pork and give these public funds to those who should benefit from them. Public monies are best invested on the education of our children and not line politicians’ pockets.” ###